BIRDS IN A VILLAGE 113 



the faculties and the entire organism. Thus, the 

 higher instinctive faculty and action of birds for 

 the preservation of the species, that of migra- 

 tion, is undoubtedly the most dangerous of all. 

 It is so perfect that by means of this faculty mil- 

 lions and myriads of birds of an immense variety 

 of species from cranes, swans, and geese down to 

 minute goldcrests and firecrests and the smallest 

 feeble-winged-leaf warblers, are able to inhabit 

 and to distribute themselves evenly over all the 

 temperate and cold regions of the earth, and even 

 nearer the pole : and in all these regions they rear 

 their young and spend several months each year, 

 where they would inevitably perish from cold and 

 lack of food if they stayed on to meet the winter. 

 We can best realize the perfection of this instinct 

 when we consider that all these migrants, includ- 

 ing the young which have never hitherto strayed 

 beyond the small area of their home where every 

 tree and bush and spring and rock is familiar to 

 them, rush suddenly away as if blown by a wind 

 to unknown lands and continents beyond the seas 

 to a distance of from a thousand to six or seven 

 thousand miles; that after long months spent in 

 those distant places, which in turn have grown 



